Nov. 8-10: New Sweden

International conference to mark 375th anniversary of Swedish settlement

2:53 p.m., Nov. 7, 2013--The New Sweden 375th Anniversary Conference will take place Nov. 8-10 at the University of Delaware's Clayton Hall and will include a visit by the Swedish ambassador to the U.S., as well as a live video feed of concurrent sessions at the University of Lund in Sweden.

The conference, “Encountering ‘Others’ in the Atlantic World: Perspectives from the Material World,” is an international forum on comparative colonialism that will revisit the history of the New Sweden colony and contemporary Sweden. It also will serve as the annual meeting of the Council for Northeast Historical Archaeology and the New Sweden History Conference.

Although advance registration has closed, it will reopen at the conference and be available through Saturday, Nov. 9, with a base rate of $80 ($30 for students), with a choice of various add-ons. On Sunday, Nov. 10, the afternoon plenary session will be free and open to the public.

Activities on Friday, Nov. 8, include available daylong bus tours to locations including Delaware architectural and landscape sites in Wilmington, New Castle and Port Penn; the Nanticoke-Lenni-Lenape Tribal Community; and forts on the Delaware River. From 6-8 p.m., a welcome reception and poster presentations will be held at the Delaware History Museum of the Delaware Historical Society, 504 Market Street, Wilmington, Del.

Saturday’s program features 12 sessions at Clayton Hall on topics ranging from New York’s City Hall Park to historical archaeology of New Jersey to everyday life in Sweden and New Sweden. A round-table lunch will be held at Clayton Hall, with a banquet from 7-10 p.m. at the Blue Ball Barn in Wilmington.

On Sunday, a business meeting and paper presentations will be held in the morning, followed by a luncheon attended by guests including Bjorn Lyrvall, ambassador of Sweden to the United States, and his family.

A public plenary session will conclude the conference, from 1-4:30 p.m. on the topic “Ethnic Diversity and Everyday Life in Early Colonial America.” All events Sunday will be at Clayton Hall.

The New Sweden colony was located along the Delaware River in Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The first settlement was Fort Christina in Delaware, founded in 1638.

The 2013 New Sweden Conference is being organized by a coalition of organizations including the American Swedish Historical Museum, Council for Northeast Historical Archaeology, Delaware Division of Historical and Cultural Affairs, Delaware Historical Society, Kalmar Nyckel Foundation, Lund University Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Lund University Historical Museum, Lund University Library, Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape Tribal Nation, National Historical Museum of Sweden, Old Swedes Foundation, Swedish Colonial Society and UD’s Department of Anthropology.